The Whale Rider Is A Film Theology Religion Essay

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

The two leaders that have been chosen for the purpose of this assignment are: Koro and Pai. Koro is chief of the Town and Pai is his granddaughter. Koro blames his granddaughter for death of his heir (Pai’s twin) at childbirth.

Leadership Style(s):

Koro is an autocratic or authoritarian leader: one who holds all authorities and power to make decisions.  Kurt Lewin (1939) described autocratic leaders as those who could "provide clear expectations for what needs to be done, when it should be done, and how it should be done." Such leaders make decisions based on their own knowledge and do not accept any suggestions nor complaints from others. As a chief Koro held individual control over all decisions made about their community and invited very little to no interferences from others. He did not encourage advice from others (not even his wife) and always made decision according to his judgement. Like all other autocratic leaders, Koro held complete, authoritarian control over his town.

Pai is a servant leader, someone who is not recognised as leader but holds leadership skills. Robert Greenleaf came up with this phrase in the 1970s. In the case of Pai, she was only 12 year old girl and never recognized as a leader but she was able to lead people, as she does towards the end of the film by proving to be the whale rider. Trait theory of leadership also applies to Pai. Trait leadership is defined as integrated patterns of personal characteristics that reflect a range of individual differences and foster consistent leader effectiveness across a variety of group and organizational situations (Zaccaro, Kemp, & Bader, 2004). Pai is an example of how a person, without any leading position, becomes a good leader because s/he has the qualities one looks for in a good leader.

Effectiveness of a leader:

Koro had a deep knowledge of his culture and his people which is very important to the Maori setting of his film. He is very effective while he speaks to his people and everyone follows him. Knowing so much about his tradition and culture and being a chief (someone with mana) makes people listen to him and so he is a highly effective leader.

Paikea was strong willed and gives a new turn to the saying "leaders are born and not made". By some miracle, Pai was born with the ability to lead. She was charismatic and interesting and when she knew she was right, she would not be frightened or forced into accepting defeat. This is the one thing that made her stand separate from all the boys ‘learning to become’ a leader. She is very effective in her role as the voice of the younger generation in the film and gets heard eventually by everyone, even her dogmatic grandfather.

Type of power:

Koro holds legitimate power over his people. His power rests in the belief among the people that their leader has the right to direct them based on his position as the chief. The island culture believes that chiefs have mana and are descended from their Gods of the old. As such, Koro gets his power over the people from being chosen the chief.

Koro also has expert power. Expert power rests on the belief of people that an individual has a particularly high level of knowledge or highly specialized skill set in some kind field. We see in the film that Koro knows a lot about his culture and is so knowledgeable in his field that he trains others on how to become a good Maori chief.

Koro uses his power in a very effective manner as he comes from a long line of chiefs, starting from the original Paikea or whale rider. Koro knows the power he wields over the people and uses this for the betterment of his town and his people. It is another thing how he abuses his power when it comes to his family though.

Pai has charisma power. Max Weber (1924) defined charisma power as "a certain quality of an individual personality, by virtue of which one is 'set apart' from ordinary people and treated as endowed with supernatural, superhuman or at least specifically exceptional powers or qualities" that are "regarded as divine in origin or as exemplary." Pai is set apart from the rest of her people because she is a girl who was born to be the whale rider, a leadership position that was held by men only since the beginning of time. She had such good interpersonal skills that when she spoke people listened to her.

Pai used her power in a very effective manner. When she needed to be heard, she knew how to get her message across. Pai uses her power over people to guide them into the future: steering them into accepting change rather than fighting it.

Scene from movie

A scene from the movie that shows these leadership analyses for the two characters is the one where Pai dives into the ocean to retrieve Koro’s tooth necklace and brings it back. This scene shows how brave Pai is and the leadership traits she has. It shows that Pai would not let others’ failure or even old traditions force her to give up on her dream of proving herself to Koro. When she brought back the necklace, her grandmother and the people knew she was the leader they had been waiting for but no one said anything to Koro because of his stubborn belief in traditions and his autocratic leadership style. Koro had ‘written off’ Pai when her twin died at childbirth and would not accept her as their leader.

Type of organisation, level of seniority and its effects

The type of ‘organisation’ in this film is that of a Maori iwi or village.it is set in the small NZ fishing village of Whangara and talks about Ngati Konohi which is said to be part of the Ngati Porou iwi on the Eastern Coast.

Koro is the chief of this village and so he has most seniority in the traditional hierarchy of his people. The word "mana", in the Maori language, refers to a person or organisation that has great personal prestige and character. In this film, Koro holds mana as the chief of the Ngati Konohi. This level of seniority meant that he was listened to and whatever he said was adhered to by the community.

Pai, alternatively, did not hold any kind of seniority at the village and if old tradtions are to be believed she was inferior, as she was a girl and she had survived childbirth while the new whale rider or heir to Koro’s position had died. But Pai did not let this affect her. She was liked very much by everyone and they all saw her leadership abilities (even when Koro refused to see it). Being ‘just a girl’ did not affect Pai’s leadership abilities; if anything, it made her more determined to prove everyone wrong.

Individual culture and its effect(s) on their leadership

Like discussed above, the individual culture in this film is that of the Maori people. Pai and Koro do a lot for their culture like the taiaha, whale riding, Maori chanting (at the end), and the use of native language (like ‘my moko’). Koro comes from a patrimonial line of chiefs and absolutely believes that leaders are males. This has been the case in many Polynesian culture settings. Their culture makes these two characters who they are and what type of leaders they have become.

Other leadership concepts and ideologies

The movie illustrates wide extent of Great man theory of leadership. Great man theory describes leaders are born not made.in movie Pai was only 12 year old girl and very effective leader look like like she was born to be a leader. Koro (Paikea’s grandfather and leader of the tribe) did not believe that Paikea could be a leader because she was a girl. Despite Koro’s disbelief and rejection of Paikea, she proved to him that she was capable of being a leader.

In Good Company

A comedy film (2004) written and directed by Paul Weitz. The Film is about a middle aged man (Dan Foreman) working as the head of advertising sales for "Sports America," a leading athletics magazine. A large international company bought Sport America and leaves Foreman with a young boss (Carter Duryea).

The two leaders that have been chosen for the purpose of this assignment are: Dan Foreman and Carter Duryea. Dan is middle aged man who has spent 20 years as head of advertising sale for Sports America. Carter becomes his boss when a multimedia company buys the Magazine. Carter is only 26 years old and he takes Dan’s position in new company.

Leadership Styles

Carter shows transactional leadership style: involves motivating and directing supporters primarily through appealing to their own self-interest. Transactional leadership emphasizes the exchange that occurs between the leader and the follower. This involves directives from the leader regarding the requirements and objectives (Bass, 2008).Carter is newly promoted to head of the marketing department. His main motive is to increase company sales and achieve company common goal. He does not really have good leadership skills but he is very good in sharing his thought and idea with people. In the film he addressed a meeting to talk about synergy and everyone understand current objective of the organisation.

Dan Foreman is a charismatic leader: one who injects high level of motivation into followers. According to Nick Tasler (2010) displaying charismatic leadership is one of the most effective ways to boost everything from motivation and creativity to productivity and plain old satisfaction. Dan is very knowledgeable and experienced person. He is effective when he speaks and everyone listens to him. In film Dan used his charisma when he asked question to Teddy k and everyone listen to him.

Effectiveness of a leader:

Dan and Carter both are very effective. Dan is motivates his employee and very loyal to them. He is outspoken person and takes stand for his employees. Every employee respects him and trusts him. Carter has no experience as executive and also failure in his personal life.

Type of power(s)

Dan has charisma power: a personal power that gives an individual influence over large number of people. Dan is very effective while he speaks .Dan has charisma and people like him. In the film when he question to Teddy k everyone listen to him carefully. He also has Referent power: comes from being trusted and respected. The new boss (Carter) respects and trusts him. Dan knows everything about organisation and has new ideas.

Expert power: ability to motivate or inspire others based on expertise and knowledge. Dan spent his 20 year as head of Sport America. He spent his 20 years in Sport America as head of marking department and most experienced man in the department.

Dan uses his power very fairly. He is very loyal and transparent to his employees. He always helps Carter to make decision and trying to save his old employee.

Carter Duryea holds legitimate power. The power describes leader who has position of power on his team. In the film Carter is Executive Officer in company. He is very good in decision making and convinces peoples. He is very energetic and smart in his work.

Carter uses his power negatively: he fires some people from department to minimise staff salary expenses. He is only concerns about number but does not think about employee.

Scene from film

A scene from the film that shows the leadership analyses for two leaders is the when Dan asked question to Teddy k. k was talking about put one section about computers in sports America magazine. Then Dan stopped him and asked "I do not understand what you are trying to say". It shows how effective he is while asking question to Teddy k and everyone is listening to him. Even Teddy k impressed by him and said "Dan Foreman…. Sports America You asks some excellent questions. Excellent, excellent questions." Dan is charismatic. He shows his charisma power while he asking question to Teddy k.

Another situation in the film that shows Carter leadership analyses when Carter is discuss firing people with Foreman. He explained to Foreman that he would have to cut off some salary by firing people from the sales staff. Dan wants to save his old employee and says "my salary is bigger than them why don’t you fire me?" But Carter convinces him that he has to follow his boss’s orders.

Type of organisation, level of seniority and its effects

Sports America is originally owned by Waterman Publishing. After that Globecom overtakes Sports America. Dan spent 20 years in Sports America as head of department. Globecom overtakes Sports America and brought Carter as head of marketing department.

Carter is on the most senior position in marketing department. He is responsible for company sales and managing staff. He is an assigned leader and has power to reward or punish anyone in organisation. He is very effective while he speaks and follows him. He is working according to company policies and procedure.

Dan holds a junior position in organisation and reports to much younger boss. Dan is the most experienced person in Sport America. He is quiet effective to motivate and inspiring people. He is respected person. He becomes Carter mentor in many things.

Individual culture and its effect(s)

Culture and tradition plays very important role both Dan and Carter lives. Dan is 51 year old man having sweet family. He has two daughters Alex (18 year old) and Jana (16 year old). He has very happy person from his family and doing very well in his professional life. Carter is 26 year old young man and very successful in his professional life. His wife left him in the beginning of the film. He is a failure in his home life and only concerns about numbers and figures instead of peoples.

Leadership theories

Contingency theory is illustrates to large extent in this film. Contingency means that one thing depends on another, and for a leader to be effective there must be a fit between leader behaviour, leadership style and condition of situation (R.D 2008). According to this theory leader does not have only one specific leadership style but it depends on the situation and quality of the followers.

Fielder’s contingency model was designed to identify whether a leader is task oriented or relationship oriented. This model contains the relationship between condition of situation and leadership style. Fielder describes following terms in favourable situation

The leader member relationship

Task structure

Position power

If all three of the above-mentioned elements are high that is leader is respected any liked by his followers and in favourable situation. On the other hand if these elements are low then leader is task oriented.

Dan was highly respected by his employees, he knew every about his job. He assigned structure task to employee and use his power and authority (head of the department) to get better results. He know his workers and they trusted him.

The Lord of the Rings: - The Fellowship of the ring

The Fellowship of the Ring is an epic fictional film (2001) directed by Peter Jackson.it is based on the first of three volumes of the epic novel The Lord of the Rings (1954-1955) written by JRR Tolkien. The film was filmed in various locations in New Zealand. According to the story line, Lord Sauron seeking the one ring that would make him the most powerful being again. From The Fellowship of the Ring, Frodo and eight other friends start their journey to Mount Doom in the land of Mordor to destroy the ring.

Introduction

The two leaders that have been chosen for the purpose of this assessment are: Aragorn, son of Arathorn, the King of Middle-Earth (incognito) and Gandalf, the Grey, a wizard, member and later the head of the order known as the Isitari, and assigned leader of the Fellowship of the Ring and the army of the West. These two characters are the prime examples of leadership in this film.

Leadership Styles

Aragorn is a charismatic and visionary leader: one who believes in not only achieving his goals but shaping and nurturing those who are on his team.  

Max Weber (1947) defined charismatic authority as "resting on devotion to the exceptional sanctity, heroism or exemplary character of an individual person, and of the normative patterns or order revealed or ordained by him." Aragorn was a hero: he saved the hobbits’ lives in Bree (when they being hunted by the Nazgul), he fought the Uruk-hai when they were mercilessly attacking the Fellowship of the ring members near Parth Galen, and his decisions after the demise of Gandalf the Grey continually saved the lives of his team members.

Charismatic leaders are to all intents and purposes accomplished communicators – people who not only can eloquently liaise with everyone, but also able to be in touch with followers on a deep, emotional level. In The Fellowship of the Ring Aragorn was sometimes doubtful of his abilities to lead others but when it came to his team members he knew what needed to be done in order to motivate them. When Frodo offers the one ring to Aragorn at Parth Galen Aragorn has exemplary strength of character to say ‘no’ and his heart is pure when he lets Frodo leave for the good of their mission.

According to Roslyn Franz (2013) charismatic leaders are quite adept "at observing others and discerning their emotional needs". Such a leader pays much attention to people during any conversations that they have. In the film when Frodo decides to break the fellowship Aragorn respects his wishes, telling the hobbit  that "I would have gone with you to the end, into the very fires of Mordor" and then motivates Gimli and Legolas to go hunt orcs so they could save Merry and Pippin from their horrible fate.

Gandalf, on the other hand, is a transformational leader: - leaders who are inspiring because they expect the best from their followers as well as themselves. According to Stephen Warrilow (2013) "transformational leadership is all about values and meaning, and a purpose that transcends short-term goals and focuses on higher order needs." Gandalf was the leader of The Fellowship of the Ring: getting the ring into Mordor and destroyed was his goal but he was more than that. He was a mentor to Frodo and Aragorn and motivated them both to become better people and achieve knowledge plus self-actualisation (the higher order of needs). He clearly knew his vision and motivated his followers to achieve it.

Kendra Cherry (2013) says transformational leader is a type of leadership style that leads to positive changes in those who follow. In movie Gandalf motivates Frodo to hold ring and keep it safe while Frodo didn’t want to hold it, he inspires the hobbits to be brave whilst motivating Aragorn to be a good leader.

Effectiveness of a leader:

Gandalf and Aragorn both are very effective leaders. Gandalf is wise and quite effective as people listen to him as he is trustworthy, honest, charismatic and reliable. Gandalf had high beliefs, he appreciated everyone used his powers to organize others and guide others. Aragorn was considerate, faithful and an egalitarian leader. Both Gandalf and Aragorn were mentors to others in the fellowship of the ring. Both leaders had clear vision and common goal to destroy ring.

Type of power

Gandalf has legitimate power. This power describes a person who holds a position and so authority over his/her team. In this movie Gandalf is wizard member and has magical powers plus wisdom and knowledge about middle-earth. He also has referent power because he is 2nd in the Isitari wizards’ order. He used his power to save fellowship of ring and fight with the beast in the mines of Moira which lead him to death.

Gandalf uses his power very fairly. He sacrifices his life to save other followers. He also used his magical power to entertain hobbits by doing fireworks at Bilbo’s party: this was nothing but good intentions on his part.

On the other hand Aragorn holds charisma power: which describes a special person whose qualities make him capable of inspiring a large number of people. Aragorn is very effective while he speaks and everyone follows him because he has charisma and people like him. In this film when Gandalf is about to die, Frodo is shouting and crying; on the verge of running to him but Aragorn takes the lead and makes Frodo leave. Frodo follows Aragorn’s lead even when he was not the chosen leader of the fellowship.

Aragorn also used his power to motivate others and lead them in right direction. Aragorn doesn’t have any magical powers but still he is able to inspire people and make them believe in him.

A situation from the movie which displays leadership analysis for Gandalf and Aragorn would be the scene where Gandalf was hanging on the edge of the broken bridge while fighting with bilrog and said to others "Fly you fools!" Because he knew that if they stayed there or came to help him they will die too. He wants them to go and complete their journey and achieve the higher goal which is to destroy the one ring. As a transformational leader Gandalf think about all mankind and their followers instead of only himself. He used his power (magical) to fight with evil. On other hand Aragorn understood the situation and followed the leader’s order. Frodo was shouting and crying, even then Aragorn made him leave and continue their journey. The scene illustrates Aragorn’s charismatic and visionary leader style because he could see that although he did not agree with something personally, he had to sacrifice his mentor, Gandalf, for the greater good: so that Frodo could reach Mordor.

Type of organisation, level of seniority and its effect(s)

The fellowship of the ring was a special body designed for the intention of destroying the one ring. This body was formed in Rivendell in the fictional second age of middle-earth. The fellowship was made up of nine members who had started the journey to Mordor to destroy the ring in the fires of Mount Doom where the rings had been forged. The fellowship of the ring included four hobbits (Frodo, Samwise, Peregrin, and Meriadoc) two men (Aragorn and Boromir), one wizard (Gandalf the Grey), one dwarf (Gimli) and one elf (Legolas) from the Woodland Realm. Gandalf was leader of the body and Aragorn was later forced to lead all members when Gandalf sacrifices his life.

Gandalf was the assigned leader of the fellowship of the ring. Every member agreed and accepted him as leader. He was a very effective leader and everyone followed him whether they agreed with him or not. He was most senior and respected person. The leadership grid created by Blake and Mouton: a two dimensional leadership model that describes major leadership style based on measuring both concern for people or production(R.D 2008).Gandalf is "high high" leader and falls in the 9,9 position on the grid. A 9, 9 leader is highly people oriented and task oriented. Gandalf is taking care of his followers and also responsible for the task that must be completed.

Aragorn was the only king in the fellowship. He never used his power as a king but he was able to inspire and motivate people by using his leadership skills. In the movie he used the traits that he had and rose to take on the mantle of leadership when the situation arose. This can be explained using the Great Man Theory. According to Great Man Theory one having inherited the capacity of leadership – great leaders are born with the traits of a leader. The approach sought to identify the traits leaders possessed that distinguished them from people who were not leaders (R.D 2008). Aragorn was born a leader because he was a king and he had those traits in him but he hid his identity from the rest of the world. He led the fellowship when the situation arouse.

Individual culture and its effect(s)

Culture and tradition play a very important part in the lives of both leaders. Aragorn was the king of Gondor. He secretly lived in Rivendell as a ranger after his father’s death. The effect of this cultural background was that Aragorn knew how to lead and he was already a leader, whether he realised it or not. This is why when Aragorn talked people listened to him.

Gandalf was a wizard in the Isitari order: he was 2nd in his order. The Isitari order is not allowed to misuse their powers according to their organisational culture. Saruman who was first in the wizard’s order had misused his power and wanted to destroy mankind but Gandalf tried to stop him. In their organisation they were only allowed to advise people in the right direction but could not change people with their magic powers. Both Gandalf and Aragorn are trying to save all creatures in middle-earth by destroying the ring.

Leadership theories

A theory that is illustrated in this film is the one uncovered by the Ohio State studies research which was conducted to recognize dimensions of leader behaviour. Consideration and initiating structure are the two categories of leader behaviour that this study uncovered. Consideration: it describes the leader who cares about their followers plus respect their feeling and ideas. Initiating structure: it describes the extent to which a leader goes in order to complete an assigned task. In the movie Gandalf takes notice of his followers’ feeling and ideas. But he was also responsible for the task that was to be completed: the destruction of the one ring. In the leadership grid Gandalf is on the 9, 9 position also called the "high high" position. In the movie scene that Pippin knocked the skeleton into the ‘well’, Gandalf got angry but he still lead the others and saved their lives. He did this so the surviving members of the fellowship could complete their task of destroying the ring.